Saturday, March 5, 2016

Nothing ever happens in the small town of Copake Falls, and no one knows that better than sixteen-year-old Eden Day. Her life is a mundane carousal, rotating between caring for her alien obsessed aunt and dealing with her freak status at school. Until two brothers move into town and turn her life completely upside down.

Golden boy, Cardelian Foster is the talk of the town, and it seems his sights set on Eden. However, she finds herself drawn to the dark and elusive Jaxson instead. Caught between her fear of what he might be and her attraction to him, Eden makes it her mission to find out exactly who or what Jaxson Foster is.

Eden begins to dig for the truth, but the deeper she looks, the more her life seems to be in danger. Everyone around her thinks she’s going crazy, and Eden begins to agree until she finds herself pulled into Faeylon—a world that nightmares are made of. Caught in the center of a dark game, Eden realizes there can only be one winner, and she is the prize.

Heidi Acosta was born on Long Island, New York. Moving around a lot when she was younger, she has lived in New York, Arizona, New York (again), Washington, Georgia, and Florida, in that order. Each place offered her something special, but she will always consider New York her home.
Heidi started writing as soon as she could spell. When she was three, Heidi's mother gave her a copy of Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House in the Big Woods; thus beginning her lifelong love affair with literature.
Writing soon also became a form of therapy for Heidi, when she realized that no matter what was happening in her life, she could find emotional escape while writing. Some of her earliest stories featured her as a princess who explored new worlds with her horse Buttercup. If it sounds romantic, it wasn't, there was no prince charming in those fairy lands (boys where yucky).
Heidi now resides in Florida with her husband, very active daughter, one hyper Chihuahua, two sweet cats, and one very fat moody cat.
Barbie Girl is the first Novel of Heidi's new, four-book, Baby Doll Series: Barbie Girl, Barbie World, Doll Face, and Southern Sugar.

Of course, I didn’t know it was going to be a fake marriage to a heavyweight MMA fighter. I couldn’t have known how good it would feel to be pinned under all those muscles and tattoos, squirming, panting, and even whimpering in ecstasy.

I chose Skylar because she was so innocent. A good girl like her would help sell my reformed image to the public. To corrupt her and leave her ruined for all other men would be my hottest conquest yet.

But I found more in Skylar than that. Who’d have thought that the first woman I wanted to lay more than once would be my wife?

Now they think they can take away what is mine?

Even if I have to kill every last member of the Bertolini Crime Family…

I felt like I was sitting inside my own head watching a movie play out as I dropped the remains of my apple in the trash and headed towards the Tier-1 fighters’ area. Uncle Malcolm wasn’t here to show me what to do. All I had was less than a year of study and a general appreciation of massages to rely on. It would have to do.

The Tier-1 wing had a guard at the door who looked mean enough to actually fight for NHBFC, but he let me through when he saw my uniform and heard that Gordon had sent me at Henry’s request. The hallway behind said door was just as chaotic as the ones I’d just left, but for a completely different reason.
With a smaller group of fighters to look after, and an already smaller staff diminished by illness, it was the MMA groupies making the most noise over here. Clusters of some of the most stunning girls currently in the city hovered around their favorite fighters’ doors, giggling and talking loudly. It wasn’t official of course, but the guard knew only to let in the best of the best.
The intensity of their beauty only served to make me feel self-conscious, as I awkwardly nudged my way through them to Austin’s door. Most of them were taller than me and the tops they wore made absolutely sure to show off their breasts, at my eye-level, to maximum effect.
They made me feel like a potato in a diamond display case as I sheepishly knocked on the door. A few moments later an older guy, Austin’s coach, snatched the door open.
“I told you bitches he isn’t ready yet!”
“Uh, Gordon sent me? Henry said you-”
“Oh, right, yeah. He’s just in the shower-”
The groupies in earshot all squealed and started talking at once.
“You come in, he’ll be ready in a second, I’m stepping out. Lock it behind you. Which of you girls wants to do me a special favor so I put a good word in for you with The Killer?”
I squeezed past him as a chorus of “I do!” “I will” rang out behind me. One of them said “How come the cleaning lady gets to go in?” Another said, “I’ll deepthroat your-” just as the door clicked shut.
Stepping into a Tier-1 dressing room after working on the other side for so long was like stepping into first-class on an airplane after only ever flying coach. They had all the same stuff that we had, but instead of bare concrete, there was actual paint on the walls, a permanent massage table, a brand new heavy punching bag hung from the ceiling on a chain. Plenty of bells and whistles.
Steam poured out of a cracked-open door and I could hear a shower running. I walked over and paused by the door, before knocking even more tentatively than I had on the other one.
“Austin? I’m here for the-”
“I told Ross to tell you I wasn’t ready!” he yelled out.
“Uh… no I’m not… uh… I work here? Henry said you needed a massage?”
“Oh, yeah. I’ll be right out.”
The sound of running water stopped and I caught a flash of movement in the steamed-up mirror through the opening. Quickly, I turned and faced the other way, ashamed at the flush of excitement that came unbidden and made me bite my bottom lip without thinking about it.
After a couple minutes I felt the waft of air as the door was pulled open behind me, and turned to face him. Standing there, wearing only a towel, with beads of water dripping down his neck and torso from his hair, was fan (and my) favorite, Austin “The Killer” Aquila.
That perfectly sculpted body looked like it was made from granite by an artist with an eye for sin, then decorated with ink in designs that curled all over. His thick arms had contours that drew my eyes up to his broad shoulders, and then sent them down across his pecs and over each and every bump of his abs.
His lower abdominals formed lines that narrowed as my eyes roamed lower… lower… lower until the visual ride was abruptly cut off by the towel, which he held up by one hand.
I looked up and heard my jaw click shut when our eyes met. I only hoped I’d closed my mouth before I drooled. If I was looking at him like a piece of art, he was looking at me like a piece of food, and it took all my willpower not to find a plate to climb on to.
All heavyweights have a certain presence. It would be hard not to when you’re a tank that has briefly assumed human form, but Austin had presence that almost seemed to make the air crackle between us and around him. His eyes, they were looking at me in a way that would give my dad a stroke. That brought me partway back to reality.
“Um… over there?” I pointed at the massage table.
“You sure you work here?” he asked.
“Yeah, I… I normally work in Tier-2…”
Austin closed the distance between us and leaned down towards me. My heart tried to jump up my throat to get a better view out my mouth at all that solid muscle so close to me, and my ability to breathe be damned.
“Because, if you’re another girl that stole a uniform just to get in here… well, I’ll have to do to you what I did to her.”
A drop of water fell from his head and landed on my ear, making me flinch. The scent of soap and the faint musk of him filled my lungs as I took a deep breath to offer whatever reassurance I could.
“I promise I work here,” I squeaked.

Author Bio:
Join me here for free downloads, discounts and news:
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A former office drone, a former nurse, I now spend every waking moment doing what I love, creating and publishing these steamy stories about bad boys from the mafia, motorcycle clubs, and mma that make me, and hopefully you, weak at the knees! Anywhere a bad boy can be found, I'll be there taking notes and making it even sexier :)

To
survive the present and have a future, she must trust a man from her past.

Shelly Marie Dixon is a woman
with a scary past. Literally. Never able to settle in one place because of the
man set on tormenting her. After five years of struggling to move on with her
life, she goes back to the man she left years ago. Hopefully, he will help her
and not brush her aside.

Adam Wilder, eldest brother and
co-founder of D.A.R.K Cover, Inc., never in his wildest dreams expected to find
his lost love sitting in the lobby of his company building. No way he’s letting
her face this danger alone. If it takes all of D.A.R.K’s resources he will risk
it. Whatever it takes to keep her safe. Problem is, will he be able to keep it
professional, because one look at her and he wants to go back to how things
were, way back when.

The only way that is going to
happen is if she’ll believe him when he says: “Trust me.”

Adam Wilder
scowled as he strode through the winter snow to the plowed path leading to the
D.A.R.K. Cover, Inc. building. His shoulder still ached from the bullet that
he’d received in the last month. He could do for a rest, no argument.

Go to Belize as
I did. It’ll do you a world of good.

His youngest
brother Wild’s words echoed through his mind as he yanked the outer door open
and pushed into the heat. He tugged on the cuff of his black leather glove and
headed for the stairs. He had too damn much paperwork waiting for him.

“Adam? Adam, do
you have a sec?”

He paused three
steps before the stairs. His sister-in-law Karen—who doubled as their
secretary—called his name.

“Yes.”

“Can you open
the closet, please?”

He peered over
his shoulder to see her carrying a stack of boxes. Adam dropped his bag and
hurried to her side. “What are you doing? Where’s Rhodi? He shouldn’t let you
carry so much.”

“I’m not an
invalid.”

He grunted and
took the four boxes from her, smiling down on her short blonde hair. “Never
said you were. Implied my brother is a lazy bastard, but never that you’re an
invalid.”

She punched him
and, solely because he liked her, he gave the obligatory grunt. An act that
earned him another hit. She opened the door and he maneuvered by to place the
boxes down on the table before sliding them onto the steel grey shelf.

“How’s my
nephew?”

“Demanding,
turning more like his daddy.” She rocked back on her heels, hands in pockets.
“Never imagined I’d enjoy being a mom. He’s everything to me.”

She smiled and
nodded, the twinkle in her eyes making him wonder if she’d not waited for him to
do it. He didn’t mind really.

Ten minutes
later, he left and headed back to swipe his bag, then took the stairs two at a
time. He tossed his bag to land near the black leather couch as he continued to
the large desk, also black, and sat heavily.

He needed to get
away. His last mission had taken more from him than it should have. More than
he cared to admit. Moreover, the problem was, it shouldn’t have for it had been
a babysitting gig. Woman and her son, hiding from the ex-husband’s parents
who—if he did say so himself—were some ruthless bastards.

For the next two
hours he took care of paperwork, lining up other jobs and making notes on
completed ones. His phone buzzed and he hit the button with the pen. “Yes?”

“Could you come
down here please?”

Adam didn’t
hesitate, he wasn’t fond of the tremor in her voice. “On my way.” He grabbed
his Glock, made sure the magazine was full, and shoved it in the back of his
waistband as he hurried to the door. He took the stairs and pushed through the
door to find his sister-in-law sitting at her desk, watching for him. Scanning
the area, he didn’t see anyone and met her gaze once more.

“What’s going
on?”

“There’s someone
here to see you.”

Another look
around their waiting room. No one was there. “Who are you talking about,
Karen?”

The door to the
bathroom opened and a small figure stepped out, ball cap pulled low over the
face, so he couldn’t tell who it was.

“Her.”

He ran another
perusal of her. Her fear was obvious and her suspicion. He glanced back to
Karen, who shook her head to his unasked question of why she called him. Derek
had a way of making women feel safe, he was the lighthearted one. Not Adam.

“She asked for
you by name,” Karen whispered, answering the question as to why it was him.

Raking a hand
through his hair, he stepped forward. “You asked to see me?” he queried,
willing her to lift her gaze.

She raised a
hand and removed her hat, simultaneously tilting her chin. Dark red curls
tumbled free as he was speared by a pair of emerald green eyes he never thought
he’d see again in his lifetime. His lungs were empty and it took a moment for
him to comprehend, his brain reminding him to breathe.

“Shelly Marie?”
Surely it had to be a mistake he was seeing her before him.

“I know I’m the
last person you want to see, Adam, but I need your help.” That pink tongue of
hers darted out to dampen her lips. “Please.”

Aliyah Burke is an avid reader
and is never far from pen and paper (or the computer). She loves to hear from
her readers and can be reached here, or feel free to apply to join her yahoo
group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aliyah_burke.

She is married to a career
military man, they have a German Shepherd, two Borzoi, and a DSH cat. Her days
are spent sharing her time between work, writing, and dog training.

Betrayed. Luna Gregory has been betrayed by both her long-time mentor and the love of her life. Reeling from the discovery that the Marchioness of Lionsbridge used her as a pawn in a plot to retain control of the 500-year-old Arborage Estate, Luna runs as far away as she can get, to remote Shetland. But though she tries to put the past behind her, she can’t escape memories of the overwhelming love she shared with the heir of Lionsbridge, Stefan Lundgren. And Stefan has vowed to get her back, by any means necessary.

Stefan ultimately reclaims what is his in a single, searing night of passion, but the wounds he and Luna have inflicted on each other run deep. As they attempt to rebuild a future together, a dark seam of power, lust and control opens up between them. Addictive as it is enthralling, Stefan’s tender abuse awakens an answering darkness in Luna. Can they stop punishing each other? Do they want to? The fate of Arborage – and of their love – hangs in the balance.

Luna walked to her backpack, sitting on the floor in the middle of the room. As she bent to retrieve it, she caught a motion in the darkness beside her and jumped. Ah, it was a standing mirror – she was jumping at her own reflection. Shaking her head at her nerves, she lowered her backpack and moved closer to the mirror, studying herself.

Her eyes, as ever, were enormous and translucent, and her skin was deathly pale; she certainly looked the part of a ghost. Gaze scanning downward, however, Luna experienced a burgeoning sense of unease. For the first time, she noticed that the gauzy material in the bodice clung to her in a way that left no doubt she wasn’t wearing a bra. It was, well… if she’d been a little less dismayed, Luna might have felt justifiably proud, because they looked phenomenal, the curved tops of her breasts pressing against the gauze as they descended gracefully into the scattering of sequins and beading that covered her nipples.
Craning her neck, she observed that the scooped back of the dress was more revealing than she’d appreciated, exposing not just most of her spine but the curve of her waist as well. And the skirt. Bloody hell, Kayla was right, her booty was… hard to miss. Biting her lip, Luna frowned at her reflection. This really, really wasn’t the look she’d been going for tonight.
‘Quite an eyeful, isn’t it,’ came a voice from behind her. Luna spun around to see Stefan sat cross-legged on the bed, half obscured by its drapes and the stygian gloom of his cousin’s room.
‘Jesus!’ she gasped, placing a hand on her chest, where her heart was fluttering against the gauze like a hummingbird against a net. Then, ‘This is your room.’
‘No, as you can see, it’s James’s.’ His teeth flashed coldly in the darkness. As Luna’s eyes adjusted to the dark she saw that he’d removed his jacket and cufflinks and rolled up his shirt sleeves. His feet were bare and he looked so… like himself. So like the Stefan she knew.
Realisation dawning, she said, ‘Augusta put you in here, I assume?’
‘For my sins.’ His smile was self-deprecating and in spite of herself Luna smiled in return. She couldn’t think of a worse fate than being installed in his dead cousin’s room, expected to replace the irreplaceable.
They stayed where they were for a moment, a silent truce in force. But then Luna lifted her backpack onto her shoulders and said, ‘I have to go.’
Suddenly, he was off the bed like a big game cat, springing toward her, grabbing her shoulders and lifting her up onto her toes.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, because that’s what you do, isn’t it.’ And then he was dragging her toward the door, throwing it open, his fingers digging into her shoulders. ‘You should go, Luna,’ he told her. ‘Nothing good will come of you staying here, I can promise you that.’
She heard the sound of muffled laughter and the tinkling of glass bottles from down the hall.
‘And that, if I’m not mistaken, is your American friend, helping herself to my family’s house uninvited,’ he said. ‘She’ll be around the corner any second now and she’ll see you here with me. So you’d better run, just like you always do.’ His face hardened and he shook her brutally. Luna made a noise, of pain or protest, she wasn’t sure which, and the undercurrent between them shifted.
Lowering his head till it was within millimetres of her own, Stefan angled his face against hers and, like a snake being charmed, Luna mirrored him, her eyelids lowering, growing heavy along with his. ‘Run, Luna,’ he said softly. And reached to her shoulders, lifting the straps there, lowering her backpack to the floor. ‘You aren’t safe here,’ he said, removing her shoes from her hand, dropping them next to the backpack. ‘Run,’ he repeated, the fingers of one hand digging into her chignon while the other pushed the door shut, turning the key in the lock.
He shoved her against it then, reaching his hands up to the yoke of her dress. She heard it tearing, felt the muscles in his arms flexing against her collarbone, heard the sound of beads and sequins showering to the floor as he ripped it to her waist and tore it off her.
‘Don’t say I didn’t warn you,’ he said, lifting her into his arms and carrying her to the bed.

Author Bio:

I live on a farm in Lancashire, England with my husband, four children, one dog and one cat. Like Luna Gregory, the lead character of the Lord and Master trilogy, I make my living as a personal assistant.

Wednesday, March 2, 2016

Tumble
into the icy danger of Antarctica with a blazing hot romance. Mittens and fan
required.

Book Description:

Fresh out of residency, Dr. Kayna
Quan opts for a tour in Antarctica. Money is short, so she hires on as medical
officer aboard a Russian research vessel headed for McMurdo Station. Primed for
almost anything, she plays her paranormal ability close to the vest.

Stationed on remote South Georgia
Island for two years, Brynn McMichaels is eager for a change. When cultures of
the single-celled organism, archaea, overgrow their bins in his lab and begin
shifting into another form, he worries he’s losing his mind and talks with scientists
at McMurdo, but they have problems of their own—bad ones. Brynn agrees to help.
The weather’s too uncertain to send a plane, so he hitches a ride aboard
Kayna’s ship and brings his mutant culture colonies along.

Attraction sparks, urgent, hot
and powerful, between Brynn and Kayna, but her disclosure about her magic is a
tough nut to crack. It doesn’t help that her dead father is stalking her.
Lethal cultures, bizarre illness, and McMurdo’s refusal to let them land force
Brynn and Kayna into an uneasy alliance. Will their fragile bond be enough to
thwart the powers trying to destroy Earth, and them along with it?

Micah Greenwich
sucked air as he pushed up from his squat, a weight bar balanced across his
shoulders. He did one more squat before a wave of dizziness threatened to bring
him to his knees. Gasping, he shucked the bar onto pins protruding from the
back of the squat rack and grabbed one of the metal stanchions for support. A
headache pounded behind one eye, and he felt nauseous.

“What the fuck
is wrong with me?” he muttered, still clinging to the metal cage shoved in a back
corner of the gym at McMurdo Station, Antarctica. No one was in the gym. Not at
this hour. Granted, the perpetual night for part of the year, followed by
perpetual day, yielded some odd circadian rhythms, but Micah rarely had
competition for any of the gym machines or weight equipment late at night.

He glanced at
the weight plates balanced on the ends of the forty-five pound bar, thinking
perhaps he’d misjudged and put too much weight on it, but that wasn’t the
issue. He shrugged. Maybe he was getting sick. Something was going around. So
far, he’d been lucky during his brief stint at the southern end of the Earth
and had avoided the colds and flus McMurdo residents passed among themselves
like candy.

He wiped sweat
from his face with a ratty towel and decided to call it a night—at least for
working out. He still needed to stop by his lab. Because he was the newest and
greenest microbiologist, he’d been assigned archaea, the most ancient
single-celled life form on the planet. His cultures had taken a decidedly odd
turn, though, a couple of weeks back—growing like mad and not looking like any
prokaryote he’d ever seen. While he might have started with archaea, what was
in his bins didn’t look much like them anymore.

Another wave of
nausea battered him, and he folded his arms around his midsection, wondering if
he was going to vomit. Saliva flooded his mouth, but he choked it back. Even
though he didn’t feel like doing anything beyond finding his bed, he left the
gym and made his way three buildings over to his lab. McMurdo was a series of
prefab buildings with interconnecting doors and insulated tunnel-walkways, so
you didn’t have to go outside into the weather. Antarctica never got
particularly warm, and nights were always bitter.

He glanced out a
window at an inky sky shot with stars, and a reluctant smile split his face. It
might be minus something outside, but it was beautiful too. He’d always loved
wild, remote places, and Antarctica was about as wild and remote as it got—shy
of signing up to be an astronaut, which was a long-standing dream of his.

Micah frowned,
wondering if the astronaut gig was even possible. The United States had cut
their funding for the space program rather dramatically. Besides, he needed
more in the way of credentials to even be considered for something like that.
With another swipe at his still sweaty face—the more he thought about it, the
surer he was he was coming down with the flu—he pushed open the door to his lab
and froze, not believing his eyes.

“Britta?” he
called. “Marguerite!”

The women didn’t
answer. They sprawled face down on the floor in front of his main workbench,
clearly passed out. Wondering if they’d gotten into the high-grade, ethyl
alcohol he used to preserve things, he called their names again, louder this
time. The longer he looked at them, the weirder he felt. They were too still.
Sudden fear gripped him, making the nausea worse.

“Jesus fucking
Christ. Why me?” he muttered, and raced to the women. He bent, grabbed Britta’s
shoulder, and shook her. When she didn’t respond, he flipped her over and
stared at her cherry red face.

Fighting a
deeply sinking feeling, he turned Marguerite over. She looked just like her
friend and roommate. Micah squatted next to them and laid his fingers across
their necks, searching for a pulse.

Nothing.

He placed his
ear over their hearts, willing there to be something, anything, before he
started CPR. Still nothing. He ground his teeth together, unnerved. How could
there possibly be two dead women in his lab?

Even though he
was pretty sure it wouldn’t do any good, he tilted Marguerite’s head back and
breathed into her mouth before doing chest compressions. When he looked over at
Britta, he understood he had to have help and lurched to his feet. Snapping up
the wall phone, he punched in the after hours code for the clinic. As soon as
one of the nurses answered, he screeched, “Send help now. Third micro lab.”

His headache
worsened. So did his twisting, roiling guts, but he went back to the women. He
didn’t need to be a doctor to recognize death. Despite the futility, he
alternated CPR from one to the next. Five long minutes passed—but they felt
like five years—before the door burst open.

“Christ!” One of
the docs—Stewart maybe, Micah was too rattled to take a good look—pulled him
off Marguerite. A tall, broad-shouldered woman Micah didn’t recognize examined
Britta.

Dr. Stewart
rocked back on his heels. “Yeah, her too.” He trained his blue eyes on Micah.
“What happened?”

Micah shook his
head. “Damned if I know. I just got here. I had dinner in the mess hall, worked
out in the gym, and then I swung by here to check on my cultures.”

The woman
narrowed her eyes and half-crawled to where Micah sat on the floor. She folded
her fingers over his wrist and took him in with practiced hazel eyes. Her
reddish hair was short, almost in a butch cut. She pressed her lips into a
harsh line, frowning.

“I’m Ariana,”
she said, letting go of his wrist. “One of the nurse practitioners. How have
you been feeling?”

“Bad,” he
admitted. “Think I finally succumbed to the community disease everyone else
has.”

Dr. Stewart
joined them and squatted next to Micah. He ran a hand down the side of Micah’s
neck and listened to his chest with a stethoscope before exchanging a pointed
glance with Ariana. “Where’s the CO meter in here?” he asked.

Micah gestured
behind him. “On that wall.” He twisted to look at it, but the indicator light
was green—safe. Maybe it was defective. His scientifically trained mind
arranged informational bits into an unpleasant pattern. “The women,” he said.
“If I’d been firing on all cylinders, I’d have figured it out as soon as I
looked at the color of their faces. They died from carbon monoxide poisoning,
didn’t they?”

“That cherry red
color is a dead giveaway,” Ariana said with conviction. “Nothing else will do
that.”

“We’ll wait for
an autopsy before we make statements like that.” The doctor eyed his colleague
coolly.

“Yes, Doctor.
Sir. King of all things medical.” She set her lips in a thin line, clearly
biting back further sarcasm. “Meantime,” she ground out, “I’m pretty sure he—”
she jabbed a finger at Micah “—has whatever killed these two.” She stood and
punched numbers into the wall phone. “I’m calling security.”

Dr. Stewart
sifted his hands through his untidy, blond hair. “Tell them to alert
maintenance. Until we figure out what killed these two, we’ve got to get out of
here. Now.”

Micah
straightened. “Wait a minute,” he sputtered. “The meter says it’s safe. For all
we know, Britta and Marguerite got poisoned elsewhere and just happened to be
in here cleaning when they collapsed.”

Dr. Stewart got
to his feet and hauled Micah upright. “For tonight, we’ll put you in the
infirmary and run tests to check if your hemoglobin’s been compromised. I’ve
got to alert the boss and talk with base security. We’ll to get to the bottom
of this.”

“But my lab—”

Dr. Stewart made
a chopping motion with one hand, and the rest of Micah’s protest died unspoken.

Ariana hung up
the phone and nodded at Dr. Stewart. “You take care of the boss. I’ll deal with
security and maintenance. Need to get the gas sniffer in here to make sure
there’s not a leak.”

Micah tried to
focus, but the room spun crazily. He really was wiped out. Much more tired than
a thirty-year-old man had a right to feel.

“Can you walk?”
Dr. Stewart nudged him.

Micah focused
bleary eyes on the physician. “Yeah. I think so.”

“How are you
feeling?” Ariana asked the doctor.

He shrugged.
“Normal. But it takes time for exposure to take a toll. Micah probably lives in
this lab, except when he’s asleep.”

“Yeah, but,”
Micah pointed out, “those women didn’t. They clean all the science labs. Maybe
one of the other ones is the problem.”

The doctor
folded an arm around Micah’s waist supporting him, and led him out of the lab.
“I’m on it. By the time you wake up, we’ll know more.”

Micah staggered
through the door, flanked by Dr. Stewart and Ariana. “What are you going to do
about the women?” he asked.

“You were there
when I alerted base security. They’ll take care of them,” Ariana assured him.
“For tonight, focus on getting well.”

* * * *

It hadn’t been
just that night, though. Micah spent the next three days in the infirmary
sucking bottled oxygen. When that didn’t clear his red blood cells fast enough,
the doctors ordered chelation treatments. In the meantime, he had a chance to
think, and he didn’t care for what he came up with. Besides, it was so fantastic,
no one would believe him.

Maintenance had
given his lab, and the other three microbiology studios, a clean bill of
health, which meant he could go back to work tomorrow. Even more disturbing,
the entirety of the science wing where the dead women cleaned showed zip in the
way of evidence of a gas leak. In the interest of thoroughness, maintenance had
checked the female dorms too, and found exactly nothing. Autopsy was conclusive
regarding cause of death, but no one could figure out how the women had been
exposed to a big enough dose of carbon monoxide to kill them.

The same was
true for him—major exposure to something pigging up his hemoglobin, but without
an identifiable source. Another few hours without medical intervention and he’d
have been just as dead as Britta and Marguerite.

Armed with that
knowledge—and a phalanx of unanswered questions—Micah spent his downtime in the
infirmary mapping out a series of tests to run on his strange archaea colonies.
He had suspicions, but needed facts before he presented them to Jack DeVoe, the
man in charge of McMurdo operations. If he went to him now, Jack, who had a
Ph.D. in biochemistry, would laugh him right out of his office. And there would
go Micah’s hopes of earning his chops, so he could go on to something more
prestigious than working at McMurdo Station.

About
the Author:

Ann Gimpel is a national
bestselling author. A lifelong aficionado of the unusual, she began writing
speculative fiction a few years ago. Since then her short fiction has appeared
in a number of webzines and anthologies. Her longer books run the gamut from
urban fantasy to paranormal romance. Once upon a time, she nurtured clients,
now she nurtures dark, gritty fantasy stories that push hard against reality.
When she’s not writing, she’s in the backcountry getting down and dirty with
her camera. She’s published over 30 books to date, with several more planned
for 2016 and beyond. A husband, grown children, grandchildren and wolf hybrids
round out her family.

Annabelle Nunn is a desperate woman. Someone’s following her, watching her. To make matters worse, she was fired six months ago and hasn’t been able to get a job since. Annabelle’s down to her last ten dollars and thirty-three cents and has no idea how she’ll make the rent when she’s abducted by Dixon Wolf’s henchman. Annabelle’s estranged father borrowed money from the Dixie Mafia for his latest get rich quick scheme and…big surprise…he skipped town, leaving her holding the proverbial bag.

Dixon Wolfe is a loan shark and launders dirty Dixie Mafia money. Since his wife died ten years ago, he’s devoted all his time and energy to the organization. And being bad pays pretty damn good. Until he meets Annabelle. Suddenly, his priorities shift and his icy heart is starting to thaw.

Dix makes Annabelle a job offer her empty wallet won’t allow her to refuse – Mob Mistress. But working for a mobster is dangerous. Doubly so, when a hitman is hot on her tail and she doesn’t know why. Can Dix catch the killer? And will Dix and Anabelle have a real relationship, one that isn’t based on sex and commerce?

Author Bio:
Cynthia Rayne is the author of the Amazon best-selling Four Horsemen MC series. Her first erotic book was written when she was thirteen. Of course, the most risqué scene involved kissing, but it was the talk of her middle school! She is currently pursuing a doctoral degree in education and writes whenever she can. In her spare time, she enjoys dating, shopping, reading way too many romance novels, and drinking a truly obscene amount of coffee.

Lily Madison thought dying
because of a bad manicure was the worst thing that could happen. She was wrong.

Waking up in the hospital and
realizing she's being stalked by an entire herd of naughty little ghosts turns
her entire world upside down. She begins to doubt her own sanity until she
realizes she isn't alone. A Goth girl, named Zoe, can see the ghosts, too.

Most of the ghosts look like
fuzzy blobs, but one is not blobby at all. He's a very hot, very annoying dead
guy named Nick. Although they dislike each other on sight, Nick soon realizes
Lily is his only hope. With the help of Zoe and Mr. Wan, the manicurist who
almost killed her, she has only days to get Nick and the other ghosts back
where they belong or the whole world will be in terrible danger.

But sending the ghosts back means
saying goodbye to Nick forever, and Lily isn't sure she'll ever be able to let
him go.

"First
Wende Dikec grabs you with her fresh writing, then she keeps you in the throes
of her story with an incredible voice and a gifted talent for spinning tales
that will amaze and delight. I am stunned. Tiger Lily will consume you, and
before you know it you are fighting for air yet begging for more. You've been warned!"

--NY
Times Bestselling Author Darynda Jones

Excerpt

I died because
of a bad manicure. It wasn’t a nasty fungal infection from the manicurist using
dirty equipment, or a cut that allowed deadly bacteria to creep under my skin
and rot me from the inside out. I died because on impulse I let Mr. Wan of Wan
Fine Lady Nail Salon paint my nails a color called Pretty and Pink.

I’ve never been
a risk taker. My idea of living on the edge was not having an extra bottle of
hand sanitizer in my purse. I knew the pink would be a mistake, but I ignored
my inner voice. I guess the smell of acetone and the hum of the nail dryers had
lulled me into such a relaxed state that I didn’t realize how awful the color
actually looked until I drove home in the BMW my parents had given me for my
sixteenth birthday.

Pretty and Pink
was false advertising, but as I learned long ago in my ninth grade science fair
project, neither the government nor the FDA regulates the names of nail polish
colors. I didn’t have a case, but I felt extremely upset.

I didn’t see the
ice cream truck stopped in the middle of the road. I was staring at my nails,
wishing I’d gone with my first choice, Princesses Rule!, a frosty pale pink
that would have enhanced my natural skin tone. I glanced up just in time to
narrowly avoid hitting the truck and several small children caught in a
snow-cone-induced feeding frenzy.

It’s funny how
accidents happen in slow motion. I remember the shocked faces of the people on
the street as I swerved and flew over a small embankment. Someone screamed, and
it took me a full second to realize the high-pitched wail came from my own
mouth. I’d started screaming the minute I’d steered away from the ice cream
truck, screamed some more as my car became an airborne missile, and continued
screaming until it landed in the deep, murky waters of Lake Eugene.

I tried to open
my door, but it refused to budge. My windows wouldn’t roll down either. I
pressed the buttons anyway, even the one on the dashboard to turn on the radio,
but none of them worked except my hazard lights. I didn’t know I had hazard
lights, although I’d read all about them in my driver’s ed class. They blinked
on and off, illuminating the darkness around me with an eerie, red, pulsating
beacon.

I unbuckled my
seat belt and searched for something to break a window with, but couldn’t find
anything. I swung my purse at it, pounded it with the heel of my shoe, and even
tried stabbing it with my nail file. I reached for my phone to call for help,
but it was too late.

As the car
filled with water and I gasped for air, the last thing I saw was that awful
color on my nails as I scratched and clawed at the window until my fingers bled
and everything turned black. As I died, I thought about my parents, and my
friends, and all the things I would never get to do, and the fact that Mr. Wan
had just lost his very best customer due to his own negligence. I hoped he
would be sorry. Thinking about how bad he’d feel gave me just a little peace
before I slipped away into darkness.

About
the Author:

Wende Dikec has spent her life
traveling the world, and collecting stories wherever she visited. She writes in
several romance genres, and her books are quirky, light, and fun. Fluent in
several languages and married to a man from Istanbul, Wende is a trekkie, a
book hoarder, master of the Nespresso machine, and mother of three boys. A
puppy named Capone is the most recent addition to her family, and she blogs
about him as a way of maintaining what little sanity she has left.

I’ve been in this billionaire’s game for a month — but something changed when half my competition was eliminated.

It feels less like a contest now … and more like an experiment.

I shouldn’t have made it past the first round. I don’t know how I did; I’m not special like the others. When I ask Daniel, he just tells me it’s complicated. Then he talks about brain chemistry, how love and sex are an addiction. He tells me how wild animals claim mates, and how he’s claimed me.

The stakes are higher.

The competition is fiercer.

I should have been kicked out long ago, but Daniel tells me I might be the needle in the haystack the company has been looking for.

“I want to show you something.” Jessica flops sideways, grabs one of my pillows, and then pulls me down by my wrist so I’m lying beside her. She puts the pillow on the bed and rolls so she’s perched on it. Her head ticks, nodding halfway, as if to beckon me closer. I come, and she doesn’t stop gesturing until I’m close enough to smell the almond in her shampoo.

Her mischievous eyes watch me. Then she reaches for the covers, which I’ve piled to one side after rising. I’ve never been a bed maker. Because fuck that.
She drags the covers over us. We’re facedown on the bed, our faces above the pillow. Jessica shoves her face into the pillow and moans.
Or, now that I listen more closely, mumbling.
“Put your face in the pillow.”
“I’ve heard that line before,” I say.
“Just do it, Bridget.”
So I do. And then Bridget mumbles again. This time I clearly hear her say, “They can’t hear sound that doesn’t hit the walls.”
I don’t know what to make of that. I raise back up, so she pulls me back down, her arm draped across my back.
“Do you remember how they said there were blind spots from the cameras? The southwest corner of the kitchen, the front lawn, thirty yards equidistant between the fountains.”
“Between the fountains,” I repeat, nodding into the pillow, feeling stupid.
“Thirty yards equidistant. Not just directly between them. There’s only forty-five yards between the fountains. You have to come away at an angle, to the south. It has to be to the south because the wall is at the same angle to the north.”
“I just remember ‘between the fountains.’” And I’m lucky I remember that. That first night, they listed so many rules and details, I stopped listening. But Jessica apparently didn’t. She lists another eight or ten places, most of which barely sound familiar.
“Were you taking notes?”
Instead of answering, she says, “The mics also have dead spots — too much ground to eavesdrop everywhere. I was out back and spotted one near the peeing fountain thing. You know the peeing fountain?”
I nod.
“Then I found two more. They’re hard to find without looking like you’re looking, if you know what I mean.”
I don’t. Not really.
“I got the model number. They seem to all be the same. And that model is semi-directional, probably because if they’re not selective, they’ll hear all the birds whistling and pots banging and clocks ticking and stuff. The noise profile is … ” And for a second it’s like I’m back in my studio, studying technical manuals.
“Are you a sound engineer or something?”
“I read a catalog once.”
“What kind of catalog?”
“I was bored,” she answers.
Jessica’s eyes flick toward the ceiling, and she runs her fingers through my hair. “Sorry,” she says about the touch. “But if we don’t do something to justify lying here in bed, they’re going to pay closer attention than we want.” And then her hand goes under the covers, starts disturbing the sheets without actually fondling me — though surely, that’s what it’s supposed to look like from the cameras’ point of view.
My eyes scan what of the room I can still see, ass up and face in the pillow as I am. I know the cameras are there, and microphones with them. And I have to admit Jessica is probably right. They’d have to use mics with a reasonably narrow profile, or there’d be too much noise to make the recordings worthwhile. Talking into a noise dampener like a big lump of foam and fabric will absorb most of what we say, keeping any little echoes from bouncing around and being heard. It’s a risk I wouldn’t take without research into what’s watching and listening to us, but Jess is acting like research isn’t necessary. She saw a model number and somehow already knew everything about that specific model … and, apparently, everything else in the catalog. It’s fucking weird. But what the hell? It’s not like I wanted to be here in the first place, so screwing up and getting booted now doesn’t bug me as much as it bothers the others. I guess it’s no more risk to trust her than anything else.
“So,” Jessica says, speaking into the pillow. “Let’s talk about Daniel for you, Trevor for me, and how the hell you’re still around.”

Author Bio:

I love to write stories with characters that feel real enough to friend on Facebook, or slap across the face. I write to make you feel, think, and burn with the thrill that can only come from getting lost in the pages. I love to write unforgettable characters who wrestle with life's largest problems. My books may always end with a Happily Ever After, but there will always be drama on the way there.